The big cover-up

Their own mothers did not wear the veil but in the post 9/11 era, many young Muslim women in Europe see covering themselves as an act not of self-erasure but of power and freedom. But how do others in the West feel about this sign of radical Islamic identity: does it raise uncomfortable questions for all of us?

Rahmanara Chowdhury is a bright, affable woman with a charming laugh and an approachable manner. She is a part-time teacher in Loughborough and, given her friendly disposition, it's not surprising that her subject is communication. What is unexpected is that she teaches teenagers 'interpersonal skills, teamwork, personal development' while dressed in an outfit that conceals her whole body and face, except for the eyes.

Chowdhury is one of a growing number of Muslim women in Britain who choose to wear the niqab, the veil that leaves only the eyes on public view. Where once the sight of a fully hidden woman was restricted to a few traditionalist communities, nowadays it is not unusual to see the niqab on high streets throughout the major cities of England and in a number of smaller towns. Just a decade ago, this form of enshrouding was seen as an unambiguous sign of female oppression and feudal custom, but now it is frequently referred to as an expression of religious identity, individual rights and even, in some cases, female emancipation.

Certainly, it is in such terms that Chowdhury discusses her decision to adopt the niqab. 'It serves as a reminder that I'm Muslim and it helps me get close to God. Since wearing the niqab, I've become a lot more confident. Once you're covered up, people are forced to judge you not as you look as a woman but on your character.'

Neither her parents nor her peers encouraged Chowdhury to remove her face from public view. She was brought up to wear the hijab, the headscarf that covers the hair, neck and chest, but there was never an expectation that she would, as it were, graduate to the niqab. Her mother had not worn one. Whatever lies behind the growing popularity of fundamentalist dress code, women like Chowdhury are proof that it is not necessarily familial or communal coercion.

Yet if wearing a niqab is an assertion of Chowdhury's individual and human rights, what does it say about the rights of others about her and her responsibilities to the students under her charge? Can they really gain a full understanding of personal communication skills when their teacher conceals that part of the human anatomy that is designed for universal communication: the face? Is there not a problem in explaining the subtleties of facial gestures and non-verbal dialogue?

'No, not really,' Chowdhury argued from behind her veil as we sat together in a busy hall in Loughborough University. 'I've had to teach those things, but it shifts to verbal skills.'

All I could see of her was a pair of brown eyes and two delicate hands which were covered in henna in preparation for her forthcoming marriage. As she spoke, the material in front of her mouth fluttered and I realised my focus was drawn to that flimsy movement, instinctively seeking out the meagre evidence of the person inside.

In a niqab, she told me, she elicits more respect from her students. 'They apologise if they swear in front of me. That's not usual.' She says that she deliberated for a whole year before finally deciding to wear the niqab. 'I think the main thing that was holding me back was my university degree. I was doing a lot of course work, a lot of group work, and so I was constantly thinking, "How am I going to do group work with all these people?" Then one day, I just woke up and thought, "Why am I letting people stop me? I'm not doing it for other people."'

Both as a student and a teacher, Chowdhury clearly placed her own right to conceal herself above the group's right to see her. The priority of competing rights is a complex issue. Even today, after years of debate, there is still no definitive agreement, for example, on the right of a smoker to light up in public in relation to the right of the public not to inhale the smoker's fumes. None the less, the basic principle of liberal society, to paraphrase John Stuart Mill, is that individuals should be free to do what they choose so long as it is not detrimental to others.

Is the niqab detrimental to others? Not in terms of health, obviously. But then nor is naturism, though it is illegal to go naked in the streets or in public buildings. There are, then, limits that society sets on clothing. There remain cultural norms whose contravention is deemed unacceptable.

In the post-9/11 era, the concept of multiculturalism, which holds the validity of 'cultural norms' in question, has undergone something of reassessment. Of particular concern has been the means by which Islam is integrated into Western secular societies. Last year, in one of the most controversial demonstrations of secular values, the French government introduced a ban on the hijab, as well as other conspicuous religious symbols, in the state school system.

To many Muslims across Europe, the French initiative was not only an attack on their religion but an infringement of their human rights. It seemed to confirm that Muslims, by nature of their faith, were under suspicion. Feeling increasingly embattled and cut off from mainstream life, a number of younger Muslims have retreated further within their religious culture in search of a more Islamic identity. And there is nothing more identifiably Islamic than a niqab.

Amid the backdrop of events such as the Iraq War, the Madrid and London bombings, the murder of Theo van Gogh, the increased state security measures and the ensuing social tensions, the niqab is arguably the most visible symbol of the division between radical Islam and secular Europe. It literally shuts out society. In such an atmosphere, it amounts to a brave and, in some cases, defiant stand to wear a veil. Women in niqabs are not only regularly insulted but have also been subject to physical attacks.

Earlier this year, Jan Cleemers, the mayor of Maaseik in Belgium, came to the conclusion that the niqab was, indeed, detrimental to safety. His decision was not based on the threat posed to niqab-wearers so much as the threat niqab-wearers posed to everyone else. Before I met Rahmanara Chowdhury, I went to see Cleemers in Belgium.

'About 18 months ago,' he recalled, 'six women started wearing the veil. Some people called me to say, "Mayor, there are different women here who scare us." They said, "We don't know what's under these clothes. Is it a woman or a man?"' Cleemers went on to tell me that one old lady was so shocked to see the women in niqabs that she had to be taken to hospital.

After various consultations, Cleemers introduced a municipal bylaw that outlawed the niqab in the streets and public places of Maaseik. Those contravening the ban faced a €125 fine.

The mayor had two meetings with the women in an effort to persuade them to dispense with the niqab. His argument was based on two principles - safety and identification. 'People must feel safe,' he told me, 'and I find that in our culture here in the West, people identify each other with the face. Face to face is an expression in our language.'

Five of the women stopped wearing the niqab, but one continued and, as a result, she has been repeatedly fined. The woman has refused to pay the fines and has mounted an appeal that has yet to be concluded.

Maaseik is situated in a sleepy corner of Belgium near the Dutch border. The birthplace of the van Eyck brothers, it's a picturesque, 13th-century town of 24,000 people, of whom around 700 are from a Muslim background. Its main tourist attractions are a cobblestone market square lined with outdoor cafes and its uncomplicated, almost bucolic way of life.

From the outside, it seems a typical case of a conservative environment overreacting to something new and different. Yet Cleemers is a long way from the stereotype of the small-town xenophobe. A tall man with a pensive character that borders on the solemn, he spoke to me of local concerns, but his outlook was international. He would like to see a legal debate that went all the way to the Court of Human Rights. 'I hope this law will be the start of a great discussion. I think our politicians need to think deeply about the problem of different cultures and different religions.'

He warned against the temptation to dismiss the case as a minor drama in a provincial town in a small country. 'It's not the problem of one city or one country,' he said. 'It's the problem of Europe and it's become the problem of the world.'

It's true that other towns in Belgium and Holland have since passed similar bylaws, and in Norway there are plans to ban the niqab in schools. Nevertheless, Cleemers's rhetoric sounded disproportionately grand given that it concerned one woman's headwear. What undoubtedly influenced his thinking was the fact that the woman in question happens to be married to a man named Khalid Bouloudo, who is standing trial in Brussels on terrorist charges relating to the Madrid bombing.

Cleemers is careful about linking the two cases of husband and wife, though he acknowledges that the women may originally have taken up the niqab as a response to Bouloudo's arrest (three other men from Maaseik are also standing trial on terrorism conspiracy charges). 'Yes,' he replied, 'but I don't think it's the real reason. I think the real reason is the extreme belief in their faith.'

According to Cleemers, who has become known as 'the burqa man of Belgium', the women supplied two reasons why they did not want to abide by the ruling. 'The first was, "We think we are the only traditional group of real Islam." And the second was, "We think that it is up to the woman to show her beauty where and to whom she wants."

'I'm a man who likes the multicultural society,' Cleemers continued. 'There is no culture that can isolate itself. But the moment a religion says we are the only and real one, then we have a problem. I don't think this ban is against human rights because the personal freedom of one person cannot be stronger and higher than the freedom of a group. Personal freedom includes also for me responsibility for yourself and your society in which you live.'

Cleemers insists that the majority of Moroccans in Maaseik support his decision. He said that community relations were very good and that there was no poverty or social discrimination to speak of. All of which made it a mystery to him why Bouloudo, who was born and brought up in Maaseik, 'a well-dressed man who was part of the city', appeared to have become utterly alienated. Bouloudo's sister, Samira el-Haski, who is married to another of the defendants, disagreed. 'No matter what,' she told reporters, 'we Moroccans have always been dirty aliens for them.'

There was a final point that Cleemers made and it's one that is often heard but which remains the subject of ongoing dispute. 'There is no place in the Koran,' he said, sounding like the schoolmaster he once was, 'that says she must wear the burqa. No place.'

In fact, the burqa, the grilled mask that is popular in Afghanistan, is a relatively modern item, but it's true that there is no mention of the hijab, much less the niqab in the Koran.

There are two key passages that deal with the correctness of women's clothing:

'Prophet, tell your wives, your daughters, and women believers to make their outer garments hang low over them [adna al-jilbab has also been translated as 'wrap around them'] so as to be recognised and not insulted.' (33:59).

'And tell believing women that they should lower their gaze, guard their private parts and not flaunt their charms beyond what [ordinarily] shows.' (24:31).

Over the centuries, various Islamic scholars have come to interpret these words as directives to cover the 'pudendal' nature of women in its entirety, which, they argue, is everything, including, in the most strict rulings, at least one eye. I had hoped to speak to the woman in Maaseik about her reasons for defying the ban. But Cleemers warned me that she would not speak to the press and, despite waiting around, all I got to see was the outside of her apartment. It was above a shop called Casual Chic.

Back in England, I visited London's Central Mosque in Regent's Park to establish what the current teaching was on dress code. My meeting with Chowdhury not yet arranged, I also wanted to see if perhaps the mosque might be able to put me in touch with a niqab-wearer. I was keen to hear a woman explain in her own words her reasons for covering herself. This was proving very difficult. A number of Islamic groups failed to respond to my requests and, by definition, it was not appropriate to walk up to a woman on the street.

The main aim of the niqab is to deter contact between women and men who are not married or related. To approach an unknown woman and ask about her clothing might, therefore, be seen as an act of provocation or even aggression. I checked the etiquette on a Muslim website that detailed the requirements of a woman wearing a niqab. 'Do not engage in social conversation with persons of the opposite sex,' it instructed. 'This is simple, just don't do it. When a kaffir [infidel] of the opposite sex asks you, "Did you have a good weekend", look down and say nothing in return.'

I did try one couple. The husband was a tall, elegant man of Asian origin and his wife, judging by her hands, which were all that was visible, was Anglo-Saxon white. I told him about the situation in Maaseik and he described the law as 'racist'. I then asked permission to speak to his wife. He looked at me as if I were mad and referred me to the Central Mosque. Would I be able to speak to a woman there? I asked. 'No, of course not,' the man said. 'But there will be men there who will be able to tell you why it is best for Muslim women to be covered.' His wife remained silent.

At the mosque, a cleric named Nasser Ibrahim told me that there were two schools of thought. 'Some scholars say that it is an obligation to cover all of the woman, but others say it is only preferable, except,' he added with an expression of judicial gravity, 'if she is very beautiful, because then she may be liable for people to attack her. She is more safe with the niqab.'

So by this reading, it was at the very least preferable to wear a niqab, and always necessary in the case of particularly attractive women. Ibrahim himself did not seem particularly bothered either way. 'We can't force all women to do this,' he said. 'Islam is an open culture and religion. The important thing is to cover the body, not the mind.'

In this spirit of openness, I asked if he could arrange for me to talk to some veiled women. He shook his head and thought. 'I am scared,' he said finally. 'Some of them are very hard.'

So I tried instead to meet Na'ima B Robert, the author of From My Sisters' Lips, an account of becoming a Muslim and wearing the niqab. Robert describes herself as a 'revert' rather than a convert, because in following Islam, she is simply reverting to the true nature of all humans.

Despite a number of attempts, it proved impossible to meet Robert, partly due to her need for a chaperone, though we did eventually speak on the phone. In the meantime, I was put in touch with Rahmanara Chowdhury by an extremely helpful woman at a pressure group called Protect Hijab.

Chowdhury is anything but hard. When not working as a secondary school teacher, she is a sports and education development worker at Loughborough University. She says she has received nothing but support from her workmates, though there was some surprise when she started to wear the niqab.

She is not a member of any Islamic group, radical or otherwise. What prompted her to take up the niqab was a period of ill-health. 'I just felt like I needed something extra,' she told me.

Chowdhury thinks that wearing the niqab does entail certain social responsibilities. 'You need to take the first step,' she said, referring to her dealings with people. She is not too sensitive about kids calling her 'ninja' in the street - 'You have to laugh it off' - and she feels that despite wearing a niqab, it is possible to convey friendliness to people. 'You can still smile with your eyes.'

All the same, to the outsider, wearing a niqab can seem like an act of self-erasure. It's hard to imagine Western history with the female face removed. From the legendary attractions of Helen of Troy, through the enigma of Mona Lisa to Julia Roberts's smile, culture and technology have been intimately bound up with the manifold representations of the feminine image. It's partly about the celebration and, indeed, exploitation of beauty but it's also about our need to see, to understand, to record. To conceal that aspect of a woman's identity is, to some extent, to forget her.

In From My Sisters' Lips, Robert complain: 'Many people no longer make eye contact, extend a friendly hello or start up casual conversation.' What she actually means is 'many women', because her belief is that, even within the confines of a niqab, it is still not safe for a woman to talk to an unknown man and that they should, in any case, lower their eyes. But that pedantry aside, in some sense the niqab does encourage the onlooker to depersonalise and even dehumanise the wearer. Because she can't be seen, she can be discounted.

'Covering is just a physical covering,' Chowdhury protested. 'It doesn't mean that you can't be a person.' She noted that she had no problem talking to me, though she acknowledged that the conversation had to be in a public place with lots of people.

The conflict that had arisen in Maaseik, she thought, stemmed from a lack of understanding of and respect for different cultures. In this sense, she appreciated the more laissez-faire attitude in Britain. 'Here, you can live as you want and make your own choice. The way we see it is that our creator knows us better than ourselves and that's why he has commanded this.'

But the key point about the command to dress modestly, regardless of whether or not it means covering the face, is that it was supposed to ease tensions between men and women and, therefore, prevent social strife. What if the niqab, as was the case in Maaseik, actually caused tensions between different communities?

'Is that tension or is that the perception and attitudes of people?' she asked.

Surely, the same question might be posed about the relationship between men and women. Is it not simply the attitudes of men that need to be changed rather than women hidden?

'No,' Chowdhury replied, 'because it's the way men and women were created. That's why it helps enhance that relationship. The whole thing about the hijab is to protect the family unit, the core of society.'

But it's a only a belief that men and women should be kept apart, much like it's a belief that it's natural to want to see someone's face. Chowdhury is convinced that there is no reason that both beliefs cannot be accommodated in the same society. She finds it hard to comprehend how a piece of cloth could be construed as in any way a threat.

'It's all about education. One lady told me at university that whenever she saw a woman in a veil, she would cross the road because she was so frightened. It's about exchanging information.'

There are, however, limits to what education and information exchange can achieve. To reuse the earlier example, many naturists believe that they should have the right to walk around in the natural state in which they were born, without any cloth hiding them. Would that be threat? Could Chowdhury support the right of others to go unclothed in public?

'No,' she conceded, 'as a Muslim, I could not agree with that. The problem is where do you draw the line? It's very difficult.'

In an age of Nuts magazine and Falaraki exhibitionism, of reality TV upstarts and pornography downloads, of roasting and dogging, of Jordan and Abi Titmuss, it may seem perverse to focus on the chaste and still exotic use of a veil. If we are going to draw any lines, perhaps it would make more sense to start with the blurred one that nowadays does such a poor job of separating the public from the private realm.

Robert rejects the idea that if the niqab causes social unease, it undermines its purpose of creating calm. For her, being veiled is all about maintaining the private zone of her faith. But you could equally argue that it is just another way of making public the private. For what is this privacy but a public announcement of the sexually provocative nature of women? It does not challenge the idea of woman as sex object; it simply confirms it. Like the blank cover on a porn magazine, the niqab does not change the actual content. Looked at from this perspective, the veil and the bra-top are really two sides of the same coin.

The point is perhaps best illustrated with young girls. I asked Robert at what age she thought a girl should start wearing the hijab in preparation for the niqab. She said that it was not necessary until puberty but as a matter of practice, it's best to start at seven or eight. In its own way, this premature recognition of female sexuality is every bit as significant, and disturbing, as dressing a child in a high-street approximation of Britney Spears, all bare midriff and attitude.

'If you read any Islamic teaching,' she said, 'a consistent theme is closing the door to potential temptation.' As a consequence, she felt that it was inappropriate for boys and girls of seven or eight to play together. In Muslim schools, the separation of the sexes is standard but not in state schools.

The wider the gap between secular and religious practice, the more chance there is of the courts being asked to come down on one side or the other. Last week, a court in Holland decided that a woman had the right not to wear the hijab at an islamic college.

In March this year, 16-year-old Shabina Begum won her case against Denbigh High School in Luton when the Appeal Court ruled that the school had acted unlawfully in preventing Begum from wearing the jilbab, a head-to-toe gown that leaves only the face exposed, to class. Begum had walked out of the school at the age of 14 when the school refused to allow her to attend in the jilbab.

The de facto school uniform in a school in which 80 per cent of the pupils are Muslim is shalwar kameez (trousers, a long-sleeved knee-length overshirt and scarf). For Begum, this was not modest enough. And the Appeal Court backed her. But what if another 14-year-old girl decides that the jilbab on its own is too immodest and therefore opts to add the niqab?

Both Chowdhury and Robert thought a niqab was a large undertaking for a young teenager, mostly because of the teasing she would be likely to suffer, but both felt that she should have the right to go veiled if she so chose. It might also be asked that if a teacher like Chowdhury can wear the niqab, why not one of her pupils?

For the time being at least, these are no more than theoretical questions. However, taking into account the increasingly stringent manifestations of the Muslim faith, and the radicalising zeal of groups like Hizb-ut-Tahrir, which supported Begum, it may not be long before such cases arise for real.

Before we read about Appeal Court decisions, perhaps a public debate on these matters would be helpful. As good a place to start as any would be on the question of what we mean by 'public'. Should the level of privacy we are entitled to in the school or the office be the same that we would expect in the high street? Or is religious faith a special case that demands its own protected zone? Should it be assumed, for example, that a veiled woman ought never to be asked to work alone with a man?

These are complex issues which at the moment we seem able to discuss only in terms of rights, but even the most tolerant of societies needs every now and then to identify a few wrongs. We should all be free to dress as we please, as long as the price of that pleasure does not have to be paid by anyone else.